The Mind Crime
by QueenOfTheDream
Summary: An underground mastermind pushing for an uprising against corruption finds a young mainline addict with a raging grudge. The young man is molded into an assassin to serve the new society, his trigger finger indiscriminate when given the order. He justifies murder with freedom and deliverance from evil. A tenuous salvation appears, but can he grasp it before it dissolves? SessKag AU
1. I Remember Now

6:00p.m.

The young man awoke from a dreamless slumber feeling drained. The plain cotton blanket rested upon his thin, bony calves, and his right arm rolled listlessly as he turned his head upon the pillow. The round clock across the whitewashed room ticked 6:00 p.m., and the small television in the upper corner of the room automatically flipped to the local news station. The blue-streaked background on the small television was nearly the only color in the sterile, cold area. In the background, he could hear someone, a buzzy secretarial voice, paging a "Dr. Hamilton, Dr. J. Hamilton" over the intercom.

The anchorman appeared upon the glossy television screen, and the young man turned his head to stare dully at the program, too disinterested to be bothered to brush the shaggy silver hair from his eyes.

"Today's top story: it seems that the bizarre assassinations of local political and religious figures that have rocked the San Francisco community since they began a year ago today have ended as quickly and abruptly as they began." The young man's eyebrows knitted together. Something tickled the back of his subconscious, and he leaned upon his elbow to scoot into a sitting position.

"Murders? Jesus Christ, how long have I been out?" he murmured quietly, his voice scratchy and weak.

"There have been no terrorist groups or foreign cells coming forth to claim responsibility for the series of what have been called 'Death Angel' murders. However, police have stated that they've had a suspect in custody for some time, who is being held under observation at a state hospital, the location of which is not being disclosed at this time. The identity of the suspect is being withheld pending further investigation. Up next, this week's weather forecast…"

The clear voice of the news anchor faded into a high pitched ringing as the sickly pale man sucked in a deep breath through his nose. His arms shot out to the sides, jostling the cup of green gelatin and its accompanying spoon on the pivoting table connected to his bed. Long, bony fingers were wrapped around the rails, rattling the plastic against the side of the bed and rustling the linen sheets. Bars…? Bars on his bed?!

He clenched his teeth, and the muscles of his jaw tightened and twitched. The inside of his head felt like it was squeezing and narrowing into blackness, with the world a small, ringing point in the center. A pinprick, really. A bleeding, ringing, screaming pinprick in the middle of his void.

"…Hello? Hellooo"" a woman's singsong voice drifted into his ear. "Perhaps you need another shot," she stated matter-of-factly as he breathed rapidly out of his nose, throwing his head back onto the pillow. He stared straight at the ceiling and gave a small grunt as a needle pierced the bruised skin of his left forearm. His heart rate slowed, and his fingers gradually loosened upon the plastic bars at the sides of his bed to curl into loose fists. "There, that should do it," the woman cooed, her voice almost sickly sweet. She pulled the blanket up over his calves to tuck it around his waist.

He held his body rigid in the bed, for he had the strange thought that if he let go, if he let himself go and relax, that he would never come back. That he would find something, a terror lurking, waiting for him in the shadows of his bed, inside the ticking clock, underneath the scrap of crumbling bread crust that had fallen onto the floor at some point.

He heard the nurse's shoes click across the dappled linoleum floor before a beep rang out, and she pulled the door open. "Sweet dreams," she said sweetly as she stepped out of the room. He almost missed the, "you bastard," muttered under her breath just before the door closed with finality. Almost.

With a forced exhalation, he turned once more to the television screen. A peppy blonde woman was pointing enthusiastically at a projection of northern California. "We can expect to see clear skies here in this first week of June, and…" Her voice dulled, and he zeroed in on the scroll at the bottom of the screen.

"Suspect confirmed to be in custody in Bay area murders. Alleged development in xenolinguistics at local university suggests…" the white letters read as they flew by.

Xenolinguistics… Xenolinguistics. He felt the ghost of a memory trail its icy fingers across his mind, searching.

Xeno. Xeno… Xerox. X-Files. X.

X…

X.

His body went cold as the icy fingers drove sharp talons into a dark corner of his mind. Dull yellow eyes brightened to clear gold as memories rushed into the forefront of his mind like a severed artery pumping and jetting hot blood into the void.

Dark cells. Cold eyes in a kind face. The feel of his hand wrapping around the grip of a pistol. Dark tendrils hidden under a blanket of black purity. The bite of metal into his skin and the liquid fire burning and searing through his veins. A bitter life on the streets replaced by the enraged life of a monster.

He closed his eyes, letting each image flit before him like a sick parade. Instead of bubbly, comic floats, bloated bodies drifted across his memory. Blood rather than confetti fell around his face. Jolly pop music and joyful children were replaced with shouts, groans, the hiss of blood escaping an artery that only an assassin knows. His stomach churned, and he felt the little color in his face drain.

"I remember now," he whispered to nobody in particular, especially since he was the only one in the room. He remembered his name, though he couldn't remember how he forgot it or why he hadn't noticed until this point. Yesterday was a blur, and he couldn't put an exact point on where the memories stopped and the blank began.

His voice sounded foreign in his ears. "Nngh, and how it started…I just remember doing …" Doing what?

"What they told me," he answered his own internal question, and the words echoed in his head as ripples in a pool, touching walls and corners of his mind he had forgotten were there. Existence was the furthest thing from his mind as his consciousness hurtled through a myriad of lost memories.

What they told me...

* * *

This story is based upon the Queensryche "Operation:Mindcrime" album, so I suggest visiting the lyrics for each chapter to fully understand the story and atmospheres portrayed. It's a great album and is definitely my favorite concept album.

I've got a head start on this story and know exactly where it's going, so I should be able to update this regularly.

Please, read and review! You guys have no idea how much it means. :]


	2. Anarchy X

He was a hoodlum bumming around Tacoma, never minding that the rain soaked his half-zipped grey jacket or that his tennis shoes seemed one rain shower away from sprouting mildew. Sometimes he used to chuckle at the way his soaked hair clung to his face like grey globs of seaweed before he cut it short. One would think that with silver hair, rain or water would make it glisten like a cap of moonbeams or starlight or some poetic shit like that. No, instead it became grey when saturated with water. Grey like an old man's hair. That's how he felt. Tired, unhappy, bitter. Like a disillusioned, miserable old man with a grudge against the government and a wicked craving for smack.

He was for all intents and purposes homeless. Daddy, Mr. Business Magnate Hotshot, left to start a new family with a new silver-haired brat half a lifetime ago, and Mommy dearest was probably halfway across the country, peddling herself for some cheap booze and cocaine under the guise of social intrigue. He hated them all. They represented a microcosm of everything that was wrong with society and the world. The closest thing to home was an old condemned building he'd claimed for himself by fighting off a group of homeless veterans. When he gutted that old man with a broken Heineken bottle, it was the first person he had ever killed. He lived for himself, and anybody who got in his way, be it war hero, mangy dog, or teeny-bopper junkie tramp, was marked for destruction if they didn't get out fast.

Essentially, he was a worthless vagabond of a young man that no longer had anything to offer society, and society couldn't care less about him. Fine. Bunch of corrupt assholes anyhow. He fumed and obsessed over how the country was just a giant circle-jerk of politicians, banks, and the rich, so much as to reach the point where it nearly consumed him. Everyone plays along so they get to steal their little slice of the pie from the unsuspecting proletariat. Between heroin scores, he dreamed of a revolution, of citizens rising up to claim their rights, their independence, and their freedom from a corrupt government and societal structure. Each injection, each sweet rush took him away and made everything okay. Life was bearable when he was high because nothing existed. Government? Poof, gone. Corrupt businesses? Gone. Pedophile-ridden churches? Gone. He lived for the short reprieves of false bliss that heroin granted him.

It was one afternoon just before his twenty second birthday that he was slouched against a building, nursing his last cigarette, when a strange woman approached him. If he was being entirely frank, she looked like a whore. A high-dollar whore, but a whore all the same. She picked her way on stilt-like heels through the cigarette butts, wrappers, and puddles of questionable goo to stand before him. She stuck two fingers under the bust of her shirt and held out a cardstock business card procured from the inside of her bra. He glared down at her manicured hand, and raising his eyes to meet her face, he saw that she was simply smiling like a cat that had gotten into the cream. Reddened lips were curved in a sly, smug grin.

"We've been watching you, boy. There's a revolution calling," she purred as he snatched the paper from her hand. He flicked away the dead cigarette butt and watched as it landed just at the toe of one of her black stilettos. Normally he wasn't in the business of talking to strange people, especially when they were selling something. This woman, however, was intriguing, and he hadn't had a good fight in a while. As he skimmed over the paper, she tucked a stray lock of dark hair behind her ear, making her jade earring jingle. He looked back up, and the woman handed him a disposable cell phone.

"Call the number if you so choose and someone will come and pick you up," she said, and without a further word, she turned and tottered back out of the alley to disappear from his sight as she turned the corner.

The card was a simple piece of white paper with the words "Anarchy X" emblazoned at the top. "The final revolution" was printed below that, and he nearly laughed. What sort of religious bullshit group was it _this_ time that thought they had the final solution? He flipped open the archaic Nokia and dialed the number at the bottom of the paper. At worst, it would be a good laugh for him. Some idiots claiming that the apocalypse was coming and that if he joined their great society, they would give him a foil hat to wear when the end times come or some crap like that. At best, it was real. He, however, made it his personal mantra to always expect the worst because the best is never as good as it seems, and it rarely comes around anyway.

"Hello?" The voice on the other end of the line was low and gravelly.

"I've got this 'Anarchy X' card. Told to call this number. What's your spiel?" He drawled as he pressed his back against the damp brick of a building, fiddling automatically in his pocket for a smoke before remembering that his last was gone. The voice barked out a dark chuckle, and he pressed his lips into a thin line.

"Where are you?"

He paused. When he thought about it, he hadn't the faintest idea street-wise where he was. "Hmm. Meet me at the Old City Hall. Tacoma, Wash-"

He was cut off by the man on the other line. "Half an hour. Your revolution begins." The line went dead, and he slipped the phone into his pocket before he walked out of the filthy alley. The building was just down the street, and he could see the tall square tower peeking above the other surrounding structures. He set off toward the old hall, keeping close to the fronts of the buildings.

The young man tried to look nonchalant as he loitered around the entrance of the old brick building. People passed by him without a second glance, but he couldn't help the strange feeling of apprehension in his gut. He didn't feel in any danger, but an odd mixture of hesitation and excitement filled him. There was no time to ruminate on that feeling because a shiny black sedan pulled up in front of the building. The backseat window rolled down to reveal a pale dark-haired Japanese man with thin features and an immediately detectable air of superiority and intelligence. His heart skipped a beat. These people weren't messing around; they were serious about this.

"Your revolution awaits," the man said just loud enough that he could be heard over the sound of traffic, and his voice was even and low like a smooth whiskey.

The young man hesitated for a fraction of a second before walking to the other side of the car and sliding onto the black leather seat. The man occupying the back seat with him was dressed in a black suit, and his curly dark hair was slicked and waved back into a sleek style. He held a cigarette in one hand and was studying the world outside with critical eyes. He looked like a stereotypical rich villain sans the handlebar mustache and monocle, and if it wasn't for the clear intelligence behind his dark brown eyes, the young man would have stepped right out of the car and never turned back.

"You see all those people out there?" the man spoke lowly. "All of them are just like you and me: living day to day, paycheck to paycheck while the banks and the government openly filch from the working man's pockets. Organized churches and multibillion-dollar corporations are complicit, and the average man is squashed into nothing, nothing more than a smear on the boot heel of the system." He turned to the damp young man next to him. "Do you see this?" he asked, gesturing to the worn clothes and general disheveled appearance of the young man. "You've been pushed down by the system, trampled by powers larger than they have any business being. This country was founded on the ideals of freedom, of equality, but we live in a state of oppression and shackles. The ideals behind my operation are those of truth and freedom from the puppet strings of an unjust oligarchy. Do you follow?"

The young man nodded thoughtfully. It was like this guy walked out of his inner thoughts, like the personification of his revulsion for the government and state of affairs in the country. Never had he thought that his hatred could take shape and be able to be acted upon in the form of another human being.

"My operation, my revolution of anarchy, it serves only to free the people of this nation. Free them from poverty, from control, from theft and corruption. The time for man to rule his own destiny is now." The well-dressed gentleman's voice was even and tempered, but the young man could feel his blood ignite. Yes! This was exactly what he had been thinking these past few years. This was what he dreamed! Addicts and disrespectful punks made for a poor audience and he had begun to lose hope in his ideas of a social revolution, but this guy understood.

"What's your name, boy?" He turned and looked at the unkempt young man, who stared at him silently with one eyebrow raised in a challenge. When no answer was forthcoming, he shrugged. "No matter. We wouldn't use your birth name anyway in order to preserve both your anonymity and that of the organization. You'll be Sesshomaru from this point forward. The killing perfection." His voice lilted at the end, seeming to relish the taste of the meaning of the name in his smirking mouth. "Sesshomaru, you have much to learn, and I have much to teach you. You will know me by my own alias. Call me Dr. X."

Sesshomaru. He liked the sound of that. It sounded deadly, powerful. Like a promise. "Where are we going?" Sesshomaru asked coolly as he pushed the damp sleeves of his jacket up to his elbows.

"The airport," Dr. X replied. Sesshomaru's eyebrows rose. Granted, he had no real possessions of any value, but heading straight out of town without any goodbyes or pretenses seemed rather abrupt. He turned to look out the window, conscious of the restless nest of butterflies that had erupted in his stomach and filled his veins with fluttering excitement.

"Hnn."

* * *

We're taking a trip into the past, back to the beginning of the end for the man named Sesshomaru.

I figured I'd give you guys a little more material since Chapter 1 was a little short (chapters will be getting longer after Ch. 3). The next update will come next week, probably on Friday.

As before, please rate and review!


	3. Revolution Calling

Sesshomaru stared at the window of the airplane, trying by sheer willpower to control his incessantly running nose and roiling nausea. Of all the places he could be when withdrawals start, the inside of a metal tube shooting through the atmosphere was pretty close to the bottom of his list. He couldn't bring himself to actually look at the sky outside the window, so he focused on his reflection in the thick glass. Dr. X sat in the seat next to him in complete composure, reading last month's issue of Time magazine.

He took a deep breath in an attempt to temporarily squash his withdrawal into submission with the questionable power of conversation. "Where are we going?"

Dr. X didn't look up from his place on the page about Scandinavian educational reform. "You'll know when we get there. You didn't require a passport to board this plane, so you know we're not headed out of the country. If you decide to bail, you're not terribly far from home, wherever that is. I don't think that will end up happening, though."

Well, if that was meant to kill the exchange, it was fairly effective. Sesshomaru tried to initiate conversation again. "Why 'Dr.X?' It's not very awe-inspiring. Not even original."

The magazine flopped closed, and Dr. X turned his head to give Sesshomaru a deprecating look. "I don't see how you're in any situation to demand answers or criticize. The last I checked, I was spearheading a movement and you were a lowlife with nothing to lose. Does that hit the nail on the head?"

Sesshomaru narrowed his eyes at the blatant insult and glared before turning to resume his observation of his reflection in the window. He fidgeted in his seat as the fingers of his left hand rhythmically scratched at a small hole in the knee of his jeans. The man's voice was eerily familiar, but he couldn't place exactly where he'd heard it.

"X represents the unknown variable," the smooth voice at his left said quietly. Sesshomaru turned to the doctor once more. "When you solve an equation, you need to find x, and x solves the problem. I represent that x needed to bring about revolution. The catalyst, the missing ingredient, the cure, whichever label you want to use." Sesshomaru nodded, turning the thought over in his head. Since the conversation, albeit halting, had been reignited, he had to voice his primary concern that had been lurking and weaving in and out of his thoughts since he'd gotten into the car earlier.

"So what are you about? How will my presence affect what you have going on?" He tried to speak as ambiguously as possible for fear of alerting the other passengers nearby. The man next to him sighed before he glanced to the left. Luckily the woman sitting in the aisle seat was wearing headphones. He murmured softly, and Sesshomaru leaned to his left to hear.

"The time is ripe for change. Do you see the disaster that this country has become? The masses are ruled by the media. They're feeding you lies in the commercials, in the sensationalist news. No real news, no real problems are presented to the American people." Sesshomaru grunted in agreement. "The media covers up the real problems. Corporations, the government, and organized religion are all working together in unison, dipping their fingers in each of the little pies and claiming to work and be in the service of the common good. We both know that that's a load of hypocritical trash. That mentality carries down to the average man. Everybody uses everybody, trying to get one step, one inch ahead in a dog eat dog world."

He stopped talking, pretending to readjust his posture as a flight attendant passed by their row. Once the coast was clear, he continued. "Tell me this: do you trust the media to tell you the truth?"

"No, of course not," Sesshomaru immediately replied. "There are grains of truth, but two or three grains of sand hardly qualifies as a whole hourglass. There are payoffs everywhere to disguise the dirty truths. Everyone knows that."

"Exactly." Dr. X grinned. "A new vision, a new society, a new government is due here. You said it yourself. Everyone knows it. Who can you trust when everyone is a crook; everyone is fighting to pick each other's pockets to get to the top?"

"And how do I fit into the picture?" Sesshomaru asked.

The doctor's face stretched into an indulgent grin. "You are an instrument of change, my boy. We all have that ability, but I see an excess of potential in you. You see through the façade and the falsehoods straight to the rotten core, and you understand how to purge our nation of it. The question is this. What are _you_ truly willing to do?"

Sesshomaru paused. The thought hadn't occurred to him. It made his heart pound in excitement and terror. To what lengths would he go in order to achieve a goal of reform on the national scale? After a moment of collecting his thoughts, he replied in a whisper. "If we are being honest, I'd do about anything for a price." The doctor grinned. "Except pull the trigger," Sesshomaru added quietly. "For that, I think I'd need a pretty good cause."

"You don't look like the type to draw the line at homicide. I'm a good judge of character, boy, and I can see that you have the look of someone who has done the deed before."

Sesshomaru pursed his lips and said nothing. Whoever this man was, he was right on the dot. It almost unnerved him even further than the withdrawing had unraveled his sanity. Sure, he had killed a man before and beat several others within a hair's breadth of their lives, but that didn't mean that he relished the idea of living in constant fear of the law if he was made to perform several murders, tortures, or kidnappings for this revolution.

On the other hand, an instrument of change sounded pretty great to be entirely truthful. He automatically reached for his seatbelt as the pilot's voice sounded over the intercom that they would be landing soon. He buried himself in thought as his right fist clenched and relaxed. There hadn't been any sort of real purpose to his life in years. After graduating high school, he'd had nowhere to go and worked dead-end jobs to make his ends meet. There was no real rhyme or reason to any of it. Now, though… now he was needed. A revolution was calling his name. He barely noticed when the plane bumped and landed at their destination.

He and the doctor stood at the same time, and he waited as Dr. X retrieved his briefcase from the overhead compartment. He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and resisted the urge to groan out loud. It was almost twenty four hours since his last heroin fix, and he was getting antsy.

The doctor cleared his throat as he readjusted his grip on the handle of his luggage, and it clicked in Sesshomaru's head. Dr. X was the same man that had been leading rallies headlining the news in the past few months, the anonymous masked revolutionary calling for a reform and governmental reform from Time Square to Sunset Boulevard. He had been everywhere, and with each city he visited, his crowds grew larger and more spirited. Sesshomaru's pulse raced when he realized he was standing in the presence of the real deal, of a true head of the anarchist movement. Despite his best attempts to control it, his pulse quickened, and he looked around, trying to peer out the window to figure out where the plane had landed.

Sesshomaru's anxiety was short-lived when the doctor turned sharply, sending the briefcase careening into his face. The last thing Sesshomaru heard was the grinding crunch of his nose breaking and his elbow hitting the plane seat before everything cut to black.

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 **This will definitely pick up steam next chapter. These first three were to lay the foundations for both Sesshomaru's background and for the whole story in general.  
**

 **Many thanks to my readers. Reviews are much appreciated and enjoyed!**


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